This is my first post on Scion Life, and I've only had my Scion for about 1k miles (1 month). I hunted all over the place for information on how to put headrest monitors in a Scion xB and found none. So I decided to just cut into it and document the procedure. I have never installed a headrest monitor before so I'm sure there is a better way. I am in no way a professional audio/video person.. I'm a computer guy.
** Standard cloth headrest in 2006 Scion xB. XOVision.com 5.8 inch tft. **


Tools I used: Drill, 2 drill bits - small and large , Round file, razor blade, screw driver, highlighter.


Testing the monitor.


Virgin Headrest


Mounting bracket that came with the monitor. First thing I did was draw a box on the headrest with the highlighter to give an estimate of my boundaries.


I cut an X (looks like an xbox logo now). The important part I believe here is to make your X much smaller than the drawn box. The cloth will stretch but you dont want cuts to show up on the finished product. Make the X as small as possible, but big enough to work with and pull out foam.


This is a tricky part. I expected the inside of the headrest to look similar to others I had seen online. Unfortunately this headrest has one tubular piece running up through the headrest, then back down with no entry or mounting bracket. Therefore I had to drill a big (actually two) hole in the tube to allow for threading the monitor cable.


I then started tearing out foam to a level that I thought looked good. This was all trial and error. I pulled out some foam, tried to fit the bracket, pulled out some more foam.. repeat.


Once I had a decent fit, I thread the monitor cable through the headrest support tube.


Since mounting the bracket on the outside of the headrest, even at 5.8 inches, would leave a little edge hanging over the headrest sides, I decided to tuck the bracket under the fabric.


Pushing, twisting, etc.. eventually it fit. Please take note that I did not secure the bracket in any way to the headrest. Theres nothing in there to secure it to. I just pushed it in.


Keeping with my theme of brute force headrest hacking.. I forced the tft into the bracket without even cutting the fabric. This way pushing in the tft pulled the fabric tight, and made for a nice solid fit.


So there ya go.. Maybe someone will have some use for it.

 

I forgot to mention, I looked around and found that a dual monitor setup for 5.8 inch lcd's in headrests for the Scion xB runs about 2000.00 installed. This install cost me $129.00 plus tax and some bunk $6.00 California recycling fee (monitors over 4")

 

thats awesome thats what i want to do!

 

good write up

 

I followed almost the exact same steps for the second headrest. Both look great now and total installation of 260 and 3 hours of work.

The Seats: running the wires through the seats in the xB is really easy. Straighten out a coat hanger, shove it down the headrest post hole. Follow and guide the wire to the base of the seat using your hand by feeling the back of the seat. The Scion xB seats are already open on the bottom for you to put your fingers in and grab the wire. Use some electrical tape to tape the receptical headrest cable to the coathanger. Then pull the coathanger back out and you should get your receptical headrest cable back.

 

*saving for future usage*

 

That looks great. NICE WORK!

 

Looks good!

 

Awesome mod and awesome 1st post. Keep up the good work!
- sh00k

 

lol, this post is from so long ago. i was searching for xovision monitors on SL and found this. Its the exact thing I was looking for though. too bad the OP hasnt come back to this site since ealry 2005.

And for all the n00bS,

THE SEARCH FUNCTION WORKS!!!!

 

^^^ Good eye! I didn't even see when this was posted. Lol!

 

Great Write up.....

 

one question...so what part of the install cost you-

Quote
(This install cost me $129.00 plus tax and some bunk $6.00 California recycling fee (monitors over 4")

is that the price of the moniter????

 

^^^ I'm assuming $129 is the price for the labor, but I don't know why the recycling fee would be included in the labor - that should be included in the monitor price.


$129 is way too cheap for monitors...

 

what could the labor have been, if he did it himself though???

 

HAHA! oops! good point.

I don't know then. $129 is such a low price!

 

Sorry I havent been around much, I have a few new installs Ill post later next week, some neon, led underbody, stereo, etc.. Just to clarify the price of the headrest install though:

I paid 129.00 for each monitor at Frys electronics.
Installation cost me nothing because I did it myself.

About a Year later, the headrest monitors are still great monitors, and I think you can probably even find some cheaper than 129.00. Be warned that some of the $60-$70 monitors you find on ebay will show a picture, but they look horrible..

I try to do everything as cheap as possible, sometimes it works out, sometimes it doesnt. The neon under my car I did for $60 bucks. Autozone recently had a sale $50 for neon. I got mine from BestBuy on clearence in the car stereo department.

 

awesome awesome write up

 

What are you using as a source for the monitors. Can you post some pics with the info of the other mods?

 

this should go in tec. plz mods